THE 

MINISTER  AS  PREACHER 


JEFFERSON 


THE 


MINISTER  AS  PREACHER 


BY 

CHARLES  EDWARD  JEFFERSON 

MINISTER  AT  THE  BROADWAY  TABERNACLE 
NEW  YORK 


NEW  YORK 

Student  Young  Men’s  Christian  Association 


124  East  Twenty-eighth  Street 
1909 


Copyright,  1909,  by 

The  International  Committee  of  Young  Men’ 
Christian  Associations 


The  Claims  and  Opportunities 
of  the  Christian  Ministry 

A SERIES  OF  PAMPHLETS 
EDITED  BY  JOHN  R.  MOTT 


THE  MINISTER  AS  PREACHER 
By  CHARLES  EDWARD  JEFFERSON 


SERIES  OF  PAMPHLETS  ON  THE 

Claims  and  Opportunities  of  the 
Christian  Ministry 

The  Claims  of  the  Ministry  on  Strong 
Men 

By  George  Angier  Gordon 
The  Right  Sort  of  Men  for  the  Ministry 
By  William  Fraser  McDowell 

The  Modern  Interpretation  of  the  Call 
to  the  Ministry 
By  Edward  Increase  Bosworth 
The  Preparation  of  the  Modern  Minister 
By  Walter  William  Moore 

The  Minister  and  His  People 
By  Phillips  Brooks 
The  Minister  and  the  Community 
By  Woodrow  Wilson 

The  Call  of  the  Country  Church 
By  Arthur  Stephen  Hoyt 
The  Weak  Church  and  the  Strong  Man 
By  Edward  Increase  Bosworth 

The  Minister  as  Preacher 

By  Charles  Edward  Jefferson 


Letter  from  President  Roosevelt 
On  the  Call  of  the  Nation  for  Able  Men  to 
Lead  the  Forces  of  Christianity 


THE  MINISTER  AS  PREACHER 


If  any  one  thinks  that  the  preacher  has  been  su- 
perseded by  the  printing  press,  he  needs  to  revise  his 
conclusions.  In  many  quarters  it  is  proclaimed  with 
confidence  that  the  day  of  the  preacher  is  gone  or 
going,  and  the  assurance  with  which  the  declaration 
is  made  is  often  bewildering  and  sometimes  convin- 
cing. Nor  is  this  to  be  wondered  at,  for  the  arguments 
against  the  preacher’s  continued  usefulness  are  nu- 
merous and  specious.  Are  not  books  multiplying  all 
the  time,  and  do  not  men  read  more  and  more?  Has 
not  oratory  been  well-nigh  banished  from  the  court 
room  and  also  from  the  halls  of  legislation?  Are 
there  not  masterpieces  of  devotional  and  homiletical 
and  theological  literature  upon  which  the  hungry 
soul  can  feed  in  the  library  or  parlor,  and  can  rational 
men  be  expected  to  listen  to  a sermon  in  the  church 
when  the  kings  of  the  pulpit  are  willing  to  preach 
to  them  at  home?  Why  then  should  the  modern 
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preacher  be  reluctant  to  acknowledge  that  his  occu- 
pation is  gone? 

It  all  sounds  plausible  but  it  convinces  no  one  who 
is  conversant  with  the  facts.  For  twenty  years  I 
have  listened  to  these  arguments  and  for  twenty 
years  I have  heard  churches  crying  vociferously  for 
preachers.  The  cries  have  come  from  every  quar- 
ter of  the  land  and  they  have  increased  in  urgency 
and  number  each  succeeding  year.  It  is  safe  to  say 
that  never  in  the  history  of  the  Christian  Church  has 
the  demand  for  able  preachers  been  so  widespread 
and  so  insistent  as  it  is  today.  A preacher  who  really 
knows  how  to  preach  need  not  stand  idle  a single 
hour  in  the  market  place.  Books  are  multiplying 
and  so  also  are  the  demands  for  preachers.  I do  not 
say  clergymen,  but  preachers.  Of  pastors  and  ec- 
clesiastics there  is  probably  no  great  scarcity,  but  of 
preachers  there  is  a dearth  which  should  set  all 
friends  of  Christ  a-thinking. 

A preacher  is  a teacher  and  for  teaching  the  age  is 
hungry,  almost  ravenous.  Laymen  say  with  a sigh: 
“Our  minister  is  a good  man,  but — ” and  then  they 
go  on  to  confess  that  he  cannot  preach.  “Our  min- 
ister is  a faithful  pastor,  but — ” and  before  another 
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word  is  added  one  knows  the  nature  of  the  tragedy. 
“Our  pastor  has  fine  executive  ability,  he  would 
have  made  a wonderful  business  man,  but — ” and 
here  a sigh  covers  up  what  the  heart  feels  and  the 
tongue  refuses  to  declare.  It  is  a fact  worth  pon- 
dering that  congregations  of  intelligent  people  are 
never  satisfied  unless  ministered  to  by  men  who 
know  how  to  preach.  No  other  gift  is  a substitute 
for  the  gift  of  preaching.  Let  the  clergyman  excel 
in  a dozen  departments  of  activity,  his  success  in 
them  will  not  atone  for  his  failure  in  the  pulpit. 
People  like  executive  ability,  and  they  appreciate 
pastoral  fidelity,  but  they  die  if  deprived  of  preach- 
ing. Give  them  everything  else  but  preaching,  and 
there  is  a consciousness  that  something  still  is  lack- 
ing. Sheep  are  always  hungry,  no  matter  with  what 
skill  they  are  shepherded,  unless  they  are  fed.  A 
preacher  is  a man  who  feeds  sheep.  While  the  the- 
orists go  on  asserting  that  the  day  of  the  preacher 
has  gone,  the  churches  keep  on  crying,  “Give  us 
preachers  or  we  die!” 

And  no  other  man  than  a preacher  can  satisfy  the 
need.  Even  a scholar  can  not.  A man  may  be 
versed  in  all  the  learning  of  the  schools,  but  if  he  is 

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not  a preacher  all  his  knowledge  counts  for  nothing. 
Theological  experts  have  their  place,  but  unless  they 
know  how  to  preach  their  place  is  not  the  pulpit. 
One  of  the  quarrels  which  the  modern  church  has 
with  the  theological  seminary  of  our  day  is  that  it 
turns  out  scholars,  writers,  sociologists,  literati,  and 
savants,  and  only  occasionally  a preacher.  Let  the 
seminaries  bend  all  their  energies  to  the  training  of 
effective  preachers  and  the  attitude  of  churches  now 
indifferent  or  hostile  to  them  will  be  radically  changed. 
The  churches  are  made  up  of  plain  people  and  the 
plain  people  always  know  what  they  want.  Faddists 
may  think  that  the  day  for  preaching  has  gone  by, 
but  the  churches  have  never  been  so  certain  as 
they  are  today  that  the  one  man  most  essential  in 
the  work  of  extending  the  Kingdom  of  God  is  the 
preacher.  The  founder  of  the  Christian  religion 
carved  out  a large  place  in  His  Church  for  the 
preacher,  and  until  the  place  of  the  preacher  is  filled 
by  a man  who  knows  how  to  preach,  the  career  of 
the  Church  is  bound  in  shallows  and  in  miseries. 
There  are  divers  wise  men  now  alive  who  think 
that  preaching  is  passe,  but  those  who  see  the  situa- 
tion as  it  is  are  constrained  to  confess  that  Paul 
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was  divinely  instructed  when  he  declared  that  it  has 
pleased  the  Almighty  to  save  this  world  by  the  fool- 
ishness of  preaching. 

The  facts,  then,  of  experience  are  all  against  those 
who  assert  that  the  day  for  preaching  is  gone.  The 
exact  truth  is  that  the  day  for  the  preacher  is  just 
dawning.  Never  has  his  field  been  so  wide  as  now. 
Never  has  there  been  less  bigotry  and  prejudice  than 
today.  Many  of  the  old  barriers  have  been  broken 
down,  and  the  Christian  world  is  one,  in  a sense  never 
known  hitherto.  No  matter  what  branch  of  the 
Church  a man  may  have  been  reared  in,  he  is  now 
ready  to  listen  to  any  man  who  knows  how  to  inter- 
pret the  oracles  of  God.  Never  has  the  human  mind 
been  so  alert  and  so  receptive  as  now.  Men  are 
studying  everything  in  the  earth  and  in  the  heavens 
above,  and  in  the  waters  which  are  under  the  earth, 
but  they  are  not  satisfied  until  they  have  searched 
the  deep  things  of  the  soul.  Man  is  spirit,  and  the 
knowledge  of  matter  never  satisfies  him.  He  is  im- 
mortal and  the  knowledge  of  the  things  of  time 
leaves  him  hungry.  Modern  science  has  made  the 
world  no  less  mysterious  and  human  life  not  a whit 
less  critical  and  august  than  it  has  always  been. 

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Men  turn  now  as  of  old  instinctively  to  the  man  of 
insight  who  can  speak  illuminatingly  of  the  high 
things  of  the  spirit.  The  whole  world  feels  that  Je- 
sus of  Nazareth  has  the  words  of  eternal  life,  and  the 
man  who  understands  these  words  and  who  can  in- 
terpret them  in  clear  and  convincing  speech  to  his 
fellow-men  is  certain  of  a hearing. 

If  this  is  a materialistic  age,  it  is  nevertheless  an 
age  seized  with  an  aspiration  after  the  Infinite.  The 
very  magnitude  of  our  material  prosperity  is  assist- 
ing men  to  realize  that  a man’s  life  consists  not  in  the 
abundance  of  the  things  which  he  possesses.  When 
one  looks  out  across  the  North  American  continent 
thickly  dotted  with  large  and  growing  cities,  sees  the 
streams  of  humanity  pouring  through  the  streets, 
notes  how  the  multitude  today,  as  of  old,  is  scattered 
abroad  like  sheep  which  have  no  shepherd,  and  when 
one  meditates  upon  the  confusion  of  men’s  minds, 
the  agitations  of  men’s  hearts,  and  the  tremendous 
down-pulling  forces  of  modern  society,  and  when  he 
beholds  the  crying  need  for  clear-eyed,  high-minded, 
stout-hearted  prophets  of  the  Lord  who  are  able  to 
interpret  to  these  multitudes  the  signs  of  the  times 
and  to  apply  the  principles  of  the  Gospel  of  the  Son 


io 


of  God  to  the  tangled  problems  and  complicated 
life  which  modern  civilization  has  created,  he  can  not 
help  wondering  why  a larger  number  of  the  brainiest 
and  most  virile  of  our  college  men  do  not  see  the  un- 
paralleled greatness  of  the  opportunity  and  hasten 
to  enter  fields  which  offer  amplest  scope  for  the  exer- 
cise of  every  talent,  for  the  gratification  of  every  am- 
bition, and  for  the  profitable  expenditure  of  every 
ounce  of  energy  with  which  the  great  and  generous 
God  has  endowed  the  highly  favored  of  his  children. 

That  the  human  voice  will  ever  cease  to  be  a factor 
in  the  moulding  of  the  lives  of  men  and  nations  is 
incredible.  The  printing  press  has  a work  to  do,  but 
it  can  never  do  the  work  assigned  by  the  Creator  to 
the  voice.  As  long  as  men  are  human  they  will  re- 
spond to  voices  which  have  in  them  the  music  of  a 
loving  heart,  and  will  be  moved  to  nobler  effort  by 
tongues  which  have  mastered  the  high  art  of  per- 
suasion. To  express  lofty  ideas  in  adequate  speech, 
this  is  the  preacher’s  high  vocation.  He  works  di- 
rectly with  the  human  heart.  By  means  of  words  he 
purifies  and  strengthens  immortal  spirits.  A man  of 
vision,  he  expresses  in  uplifting  language  the  glories 
which  his  soul  has  seen. 


ii 


What  greater  work  on  earth  than  this  can  any  man 
conceive  of?  Jesus  of  Nazareth  was  a preacher. 
His  greatest  miracles  were  performed  by  His  tongue. 
Men  bowed  before  Him  because  no  other  man  had 
ever  spoken  as  He  spoke.  It  was  His  conviction  that 
while  heaven  and  earth  would  pass  away  His  words 
would  never  pass  away.  Down  to  the  latest  gener- 
ation men  will  be  set  apart  to  the  high  work  of  caus- 
ing these  words  to  live  in  the  hearts  and  homes  of 
men.  No  other  work  will  ever  take  precedence  over 
this.  No  progress  of  humanity  will  ever  render  this 
work  unnecessary.  There  will  be  seasons,  now  and 
then,  no  doubt,  when  other  kinds  of  work,  executive, 
pastoral,  ceremonial,  philanthropic  will  seem  to  have 
a use  and  glory  which  preaching  does  not  have,  but 
such  seasons  will  be  few  and  transitory.  So  long  as 
the  world  exists,  God  will  continue  to  ordain  preach- 
ers, and  these  men,  when  baptized  with  the  Holy 
Spirit,  will  resist  every  inducement  to  turn  aside  to 
other  forms  of  service,  saying  as  the  Apostles  said 
nineteen  centuries  ago:  “We  will  continue  stedfastly 
in  prayer,  and  in  the  ministry  of  the  word.” 


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